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The effort, led by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, so far has two other backers — Massie and Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona. President Biden said he would sign the package into law and called on the House to pass it this week and the Senate to quickly follow. The House passed another amendment from Rep. Carlos Giménez, R-Fla., by voice vote requiring the Pentagon’s annual China military power report to assess Beijing’s investments in emerging technology. After months of delay at the hands of a bloc of ultraconservative Republicans, the package drew overwhelming bipartisan support, reflecting broad consensus. "We need to treat all four of these areas, all four of them, Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan and the border," McConnell told reporters. Johnson released a joint statement with the rest of the House GOP leadership team Monday, declaring the legislation “dead on arrival” and instead pushing their bill, which would supply Israel with additional aid in its war against Hamas.
Lawmakers chafe at nonprofit earmark ban, tight request deadline
“It is unfortunate that the House of Representatives is using the cover of important foreign and humanitarian assistance to once again jam through a ban bill,” Alex Haurek, a spokesman for the company, said in a statement on Wednesday. He said the bill would hurt the free speech rights of 170 million Americans and seven million small businesses and eliminate a company that contributed billions of dollars to the U.S. economy. Further complicating the package, a group of Senate Republicans have been negotiating border security measures that would go beyond Biden’s request, an attempt to help control the influx of migrants. President Joe Biden has requested $14.3 billion for Israel, $61.4 billion to support Ukraine, $9.1 billion for humanitarian efforts in Gaza and elsewhere and $7.4 billion for the Indo-Pacific, where the U.S. is focused on countering China’s influence. Some of the Ukraine funding would go toward replenishing domestic stockpiles of weapons that have already been provided.
U.S. TikTok Bill
"I will be voting NO on all funding packages for the Ukraine war (as I have from the beginning) and now the Israel war," Greene wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, on Sunday. “The Senate will no longer have excuses, however misguided, against swift passage of this critical support for our ally,” Johnson wrote in his letter. 14 House Republicans voted against the latter Israel aid bill in February, with many citing the cost of the aid. President Joe Biden has pledged to sign the bill into law after it passes the Senate in the coming days, a move that could anger those on the progressive left who have called for him to take a different approach to Israel's war in Gaza, where over 30,000 Palestinians have been killed. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin are testifying before the Senate this morning on U.S. military aid for Israel and Ukraine, or at least they're trying to. Secretary Blinken's testimony was interrupted constantly by protesters in the hearing room.
Biden goes backward on permitting reform
The combined bill closely mirrors a $95.3 billion national security bill passed by the Senate in February. The unexpected move indicates that Johnson is digging his heels in against an immigration compromise and Ukraine funding, while suggesting that Israel aid is the only part of President Joe Biden’s national security supplemental request that House Republicans are prepared to pass. The House on Tuesday failed to pass a stand-alone bill to provide aid to Israel amid congressional infighting over a bipartisan Senate border bill that also included foreign aid to Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan.
The United States House of Representatives has passed a $95bn legislative package providing security assistance to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. "I hope they will not move forward with that," he said of the GOP trio that is sponsoring the motion to vacate resolution. "I think we ought to have a contest in November, a deliberative process to select, hopefully, the speaker of the House majority. But I don't think it'd be a wise course of action to do that now." There was speculation that Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene would trigger a motion to vacate the speaker after Saturday's vote.
In the end, even in the face of an ouster threat from ultraconservative members, he circumvented the hard-line contingent of lawmakers that once was his political home and relied on Democrats to push the measure through. It was a remarkable turnabout for a right-wing lawmaker who voted repeatedly against aid to Ukraine as a rank-and-file member, and as recently as a couple of months ago declared he would never allow the matter to come to a vote until his party’s border demands were met. Former President Donald Trump has also been directing Republicans to vote against any border security measure until after the 2024 presidential election, fomenting even stronger support against any Senate proposal. Johnson has signaled his opposition to a Senate bill containing less than the measures proposed by House Republicans’ border security bill, known as H.R. 2, but has not said whether he would not put that proposal on the floor given that the text has yet to be released by Senate negotiators.
If the measure is signed into law, it is likely to face weeks or months of legal challenges. Federal judges blocked a 2020 attempt by President Donald J. Trump to ban TikTok or force its sale. Last year, a federal judge temporarily blocked a statewide ban of TikTok from taking effect in Montana, preventing the nation’s first such prohibition.
Greene says she’ll trigger motion to vacate next week
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy expressed his gratitude on Saturday, saying US lawmakers moved to keep “history on the right track”. The money would “translate into thousands of Palestinian casualties in the Gaza Strip” and the occupied West Bank, said Nabil Abu Rudeina, spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Several Western donors have since resumed funding to UNRWA, which is a lifeline for nearly two million people in Gaza. The bill, which was stalled for a long time following deep splits in Republican camps, now heads to the Senate for a vote. On Friday, a third Republican member signed onto the effort to remove Johnson as speaker. Ahead of the vote, Rep. Michael McCaul, who chairs the Foreign Affairs Committee, said, "History will judge us by our actions here today."
House GOP unveils $14.3 billion Israel aid bill that would cut funding to IRS - CBS News
House GOP unveils $14.3 billion Israel aid bill that would cut funding to IRS.
Posted: Mon, 30 Oct 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]
House passes contentious Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan aid package
With all this support, Russia has ramped up its airstrikes against Ukrainian cities and critical infrastructure, rained down munitions on U- — brave Ukrainians defending their homeland. And now Americans are going to send Ukraine the supplies they need to keep them in the fight. For months, while MAGA Republicans were blocking aid, Ukraine has been running out of artillery shells and ammunition. It gives vital support to America’s partners and they — so they can defend themselves against threats to their sovereignty and to the lives and freedom of their citizens.
House lawmakers are expected to vote Saturday on a package of legislation that includes the TikTok ban and other bills popular with Republicans, a maneuver intended to induce lawmakers to vote for the foreign aid. If the package passes, the measures will be sent as a single bill to the Senate, which could vote soon after. President Biden has said he’ll sign TikTok legislation into law if it reaches his desk. Two months ago, the Senate voted to pass a similar $95 billion foreign aid package — but without the TikTok provision.
Austin said the money would help Israel and Ukraine defend themselves against aggression — and also replenish U.S. stockpiles. That money would be used to boost the number of border agents, install new inspection machines to detect fentanyl and to increase staffing for processing asylum cases. “This package passed, but it calls into question what might happen next if Ukraine needs more funds in the future,” Culhane added.
And in February, just 46 Democrats voted for an Israel aid bill that didn't include those cuts, with Democrats largely taking the position that they wanted to see Ukraine aid paired with Israel aid. "My philosophy is, you do the right thing and you let the chips fall where they may," Johnson told reporters. "If I operated out of fear over a motion to vacate, I would never be able to do my job." Washington — House Republican leadership on Wednesday unveiled the legislative text for three bills that are part of a complicated plan by Speaker Mike Johnson to get aid to U.S. allies while addressing concerns from conservatives. “Instead of working in good faith to address the most pressing national security challenges, this bill is another cynical political maneuver,” the Office of Management and Budget said in a statement of administration policy. Democrats had argued the bill was politicized because a bipartisan group of senators has already agreed to a separate package that addresses aid to Israel, as well as the southern border and aid to Ukraine.
Rep. Betty McCollum of Minnesota, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee’s defense subcommittee, concurred. Opponents maintain that pulling back the IRS funding would erode its ability to collect revenue. The money is meant to fund a crackdown on wealthier tax evaders and bigger corporations that aren’t paying their taxes. The bill would also put $850 million toward further procurement efforts, while an additional $1.35 billion would be largely designated for Israel’s development of an “Iron Beam” system to counter short-range rockets, according to the bill text.
The scene on the House floor reflected both the broad support in Congress for continuing to help the Ukrainian military beat back Russia, and the extraordinary political risk taken by Mr. Johnson to defy the anti-interventionist wing of his party who had sought to thwart the measure. Minutes before the vote on assistance for Kyiv, Democrats began to wave small Ukrainian flags on the House floor, as hard-right Republicans jeered. On Monday, House Republicans presented a plan to provide $14.3 billion in aid to Israel by cutting funding for the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), separating the issue from that of further assistance to Ukraine. Complicating matters for Johnson, however, is how the far-right flank of his conference will react. They celebrated Johnson’s inaugural bill that sent aid to Israel and included cuts to the IRS, which Republicans have long called for. But the House Freedom Caucus has remained opposed to passing funding bills that do not include cuts and Johnson’s latest maneuver of relying on Democrats to send bills to the Senate given Republicans narrow three-seat majority.
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